The holiday break is almost here, and with it, the end of 2026! Wrap up your year with one more poetry workshop, featuring poet Amber Flora Thomas! This poetry workshop will take place on JMU's campus in the Gwendolyn Brooks Reading Room at Carrier Library on Friday, November 13, 12:00- 1:15 PM. All are welcome, though registration is advised. Free parking will be available in the Grace Street Parking Deck during the workshop.

Title: The Elasticity of Camera Work in Poems

Description: From the complex to the minute, this session will explore how poets use “camera work” to create veracity, tension, and expansiveness in poems. There is more to imagery than the snapshot, the still life. Where the eye goes, so does the reader’s attention. Sensory awareness can be a slipstream when poets allow it to create transitional movement from the “now” into memory. We will explore how to use “camera work” to reduce navel-gazing and create more complexity in our poems. This session includes a generative writing period during which participants will be offered prompts to guide them in producing these effects in their own poems.